Warp conditioning process for tying-in machines



Patented Oct. 27, 1936 WARP CONDITIONING PROCESS FOR TYING-IN moms Stoney Drake, Atlanta, Ga, assignor to Drake Corporation, a corporation of Virginia No Drawing. Application July '3, 1934,

Serial No. 734,205

- M i'llaims.

The present application relates to a product and process for conditioning warps, composed partly or wholly of cotton and hereinafter termed "cotton warps", in connection with their utilizationin tying-in machines particularly of the Barber-Colman type.

In textile mills which employ tying-in machines for cotton warps of the character above described, it is necessary to maintain a most careful control of atmospheric temperatures and particularly of atmospheric humidity during various stages in the textile processes to assure that a most satisfactory tied-in warp will be produced with a minimum of dimculty and/or breakage and with a minimum of machine stoppages.

To maintain these proper atmospheric conditions it is necessary to install expensive air conditioning equipment, and this would not be particularly objectionable, but for the fact that the air conditioning has tube of such a nature as to be not desirable from the viewpoint of human comfort and health. Y

Generally-it is necessary to maintain a relatively high degree oi humidity and this humidity must he particularly high when the tying-in machines of the Barber-Colman type are employed.

Before a cotton warp can be woven with a weft to form a iabric, the individual warp threads have to be drawn through drop wires, harnesses and a reed in proper order, which is a rather long and dimcult process involving tedious manuallabor.

When the cotton warp has been woven completely and it is necessary to utilize a new warp, it is desirable, if possible, to tie the old warp to the new warp so that it will not be necessary again to go through the tediousand time-consuming process of drawing the new threads through the drop wires; harness and reed.

It has now been customary, in doing this, to tie the new warp to the old warp in such a manner that the corresponding individual threads of the old warp will be tied to the new warp and the new warpxwill thus be drawn through the drop, wire, harness and reed in the proper order.

The usual method of doing this is by tying-in machines and it has been found necessary to maintain a very high degree oi humidity to per-'- mit the proper tension being placed upon the cotton warp threads when they are placed in the tying-in machines to permit proper and satisfactorytying of the old andnew'warps correctly together.

The amount of relative humidity necessary to condition the cotton warp threads for this tyingin process has to vary with the particular char acter of the warp and with the amount of tension. or to the sizing which may have been appliedthereto. For example, with some sized warp it is often necessary to increase the relative humidity in the air to very high degree, often up to 96% In most mills to overcome these dificulties. it has been customary for the departments using the tying-4n machine to be placed in a small room inwhich air is maintained very moist. Not only' is this relatively high humidity in the tying-in room unhealthful to the workers, but

in addition since difierent warps are being passed through the tyingin room, it is most dlmcult to maintain proper humidity in the ail? at all times which would he satisfactory for each warp as p it is particularly dimcult to change the humidity within a reasonable time.

The object of the present invention is to provide a product and a process which will enable the simplification of this tying-in operation particularly in connection with tying-in machines of the Barber-Colman type, and will enalole such tying-in operation to he carried out at the average humidity existing in the loom room or in other rooms in the mill without the necessity of pro viding special rooms and without the necessity of utilizing an extremely high humidity for the tyingdn operation.

Another object is to provide a product and a' process which will enable the tying-in of various types oi cotton warps, particularly in connection with tying-in machines of the Barber-Colman type, with exact and'predetermined regulation of the'humidity and moisture content of the warp, so that the warp threads may he placed under place and to prevent tying doubles.' I

Another object is to provide a product and a process which would enable the tying-in of various type of cotton warps under tension, particularly in connection with tying-in machines of the Barber-Colman type, which will so reduce the number of stops oi? the machine as to enable full. production from the machines even at reduced the necessary tension to hold them in speeds as low as half the usual speeds and which at the same time will prolong the life of these relatively expensive tying-in machines and reducev thenumber of replacement parts needed during the course of operation.

Other objects will appear during the course of the following specifications. To clarify the present'in'vention itmight be well to describe with some detail, the operation of tying-in machines,

particularly of the Barber-Colman type, which old warp, which has been almost entirely' c0n-.

sumed except for a residual portion about say two yards in length, is removed from the loom together with the drop wires, harnesses and reeds, in which it has been properly positioned. This old warp is-then placed in the tying-in machine directly above the new warp with only about onehalf inch distance between the lower sheet of threads forming the new warp and the upper sheet of threads forming the old warp.

Before the tying-in operation .each sheet of threads is carefully combed or brushed lengthwise and then the sheet of warp threads is firmly clamped in place by application of the clamp bars of the tying-in machines. These operations are desirable to make certain that each thread lies in its proper place and that it will be held there when tension is applied to the sheets of threads.

Then the ends of the old warp and new warp are knotted together.- In order to make certain, however, that only the corresponding threads from the top sheet, or old warp, and from the bottom sheet, or new warp, will be properly selected and knotted together, there are two selectors provided, one for the corresponding old and new warp threads. The latter, which may be termed the bottom' selector, comes up at the proper time from'below the bottom sheet of threads selecting the outside threads and raises this thread up to a point halfway between the two sheets of threads. At the same time the top selector descends from above the top sheet of threads, picks off the corresponding outside thread and lowers this thread to said halfway point. Then the knotter device clasps the ends of the two threads, which have thus been selected, ties the knot and cuts off the projecting loose ends of the old, warp and new warp, close up to the knot.

The fault of tying doubles, which is very frequently encountered, is due to the fact-that either the top or bottom selector may pick up two threads where each should pick up but one. Where a war'p in which a double has been tied is woven into cloth, a defect, termed a flat, will be formed in the woven cloth, if this extra thread is not broken out and allowed to wind around the loom beam instead of being woven into the cloth.

These warp threads, which are broken out and permitted to remain upon the loom beam, are made into waste and sold at a very lowmarket price, which represents a considerable loss, in view of the fact the warp threads are most carefully prepared and of considerable value.

Another difliculty experienced in these machines termed Stumbling results when one or more selectors fails to select its thread. When this occurs, the machine will not tie the knot if only one thread is presented in place of two but instead the machine will stumble and stop.

In accomplishing the objects of the present invention, it has been found most satisfactory to apply to the warp threads'a solution to condition the warp threads so they will have proper elasticity substantially regardless of the humidity or atmospheric conditions or amount of size on each thread.

The solution and products which have been found most suitable to apply to the warp are those which contain in water solution or emulsion, a modified oil or oily material, a penetrating agent to permit quick penetration by lowering the surface tension of the water and a suitable fungicide.

Among the preferred oils or oily materials are soap, sulphonated castor oil, olive oil, and other vegetables and animal oils, with which may also be included some non-sulphonated animal, vegetable and/or mineral oils, such as Neatsfoot oil, linseed oil, soya bean oil, white mineral oil, and so forth. ,These oils or oily materials or soaps are all included by the expression "oily derivative material. These materials may also be in cluded by the expressions, emulsifying agents, homogenizing agents, or sulphonated high molecular weight aliphatic materials.

To cause quick penetration, it is desirable to use hydroxy compounds, such as glycerine, glycol, ethanolamines.

As a fungicide it is satisfactory to utilize phenol, cresol, naphthols, chlorinated and/or nitrated phenolic compounds, pine oil, formaldehyde, fluorides, and so forth.

All these ingredients should be of such anature as not to cause sticking or gumming of the machine parts.

In the preferred compounds, one part of the oily material, one part of the penetrating agent and one part of the fungicide are utilized for each ten to twenty parts of water and the compound may be used on varying warps having different amounts and character of sizing. One single condition'ing made according to the present invention may be used equally well for the most heavily sized warps, as well as for those of less size content.

The solution is preferably applied to the warp threads, while the same are loaded on the Barber- Colman tying-in machine, as all the way across thewarp from selvage to selvage and for a distance of only about half an inch lengthwise of I the threads, next to the ribbon bars where the top and bottom selectors respectively engagethe threads of the old and new warps; and then subsequently to the knots after they have been tied, but before the drop wire, harness and reed assembly have been pulled over the knots.

By applying the conditioning solution in this way there will be less possibility of trouble due to the tube" stopping up because of cut off wet thread ends sticking inside of the tube. When the conditioning is initially applied adjacent to the ribbon bars this will leave the ends of the warp threads unconditioned and will permit the knotter and the cutter device to work upon thread ends which are not in moistened condition. These tubes are used on the machine to convey theshort cut ofl ends of the warp threads by suction to a waste receptacle.

In addition to eliminating entirely the necessity of maintaining high degrees of relative humidity in the tying-in rooms, actual daily operations have proven that the tying-in operation-proceeds much more satisfactory according to the process of the present invention than previously even with the high degree of humidity.

For example, where thetying-in machine for merly stopped as many as twenty-four times while tying a. warp of 3,000 ends or threads, it will aotaoea 3 Where formerly many threads were broken I when pulling the drop wires, harness and'reed over knots joining together the new and old warps,fit is nowpossible to perform this operation without breaking any threads. The improvement in the operation of the tying-in machine in rooms without a high degree of relative humidity made possible by applying to the threads 5 the conditioning compound of the present application also has shown that it is nolonger necessary to operate these tying-in machines at the usual high rate of speed.

Due to a lesser number of stoppages of the 20 machine, it is possible for the tying-in machine to keep up the former rate of production while operating at much reduced speeds, in some cases as low as 50% of the former speed. Not only does this make for a better'class of work turned off the 25 machine, but in addition it prolongs the life of 'the .relatively expensive machines which are utilized for this purpose, these tying-in machines often costing many thousands of dollars.

Moreover, the conditioning compound pro- 30 duced according to the present invention is so relatively inexpensive that it adds very little to the cost of the materials and it is not even practical to figure its cost per pound of. warp so treated. r v 35 -In the preferred composition of the present invention, it may be noted that it is also desired to add an agent to the conditioning solution-to prevent therusting of the metal parts of the machine with which the warp so treated may come in con- 40 tact. It is to be understood that the application of the conditioning solution of the present invention does not condition the warps for weaving process but only for the tying-in operation. Moreover, 45 the conditioning solution is only to be applied to that part of the warp which is contacted by the selectors on the tying-in machine. In operation, although the strain and stress may be applied to the entire length of each thread between where h 50 said threa'ds'are gripped by the clamp bars, ac-

tual breakage of thethreads, when they break, during the operation of tying preferentially will take place where the selectors contact with the threads. This breakage usually results because- --55 of the action of the selectors causing the threads to be bent at an angle prior to tying of the knot.

It is by the use of theconditioning and lubrieating solution at this point 'where the selectors contact'the threads, that the threads are so con- 60 ditioned. toughened, and lubricated that breakage of the threads at this point of tying is substantially overcome-and largely prevented.

The present invention particularly eliminates the tendency of the loose cotton fibre ends pro- 65 J'ecting out from the surface of threadsnot so conditioned; to cause more than one or two threads to be picked up by the selector when only one thread is wanted. It is this difficulty arising from the projection of loose cotton fibre ends 70 that causes the tying of doubles. When the conditioning solution of the present invention is applied, the fibre ends are caused to lie down against the thread from which it projects, thereby elim-' inating thetendency of the selector picking up 75 more than one thread which may be needed.

It is aparticular advantage of the present in- 'vention in preventing the tying of doubles, as

specified above. Where doubles are formedwithout application of the conditioning solution of the present invention, it is necessary .to break out the surplus threads to prevent the production of a flat in the cloth and the broken out threads are allowed to wind around the loom beam. In view of the fact that the warps are originally made up to contain the exact number of warp threads for the particular construction and width of the woven'fabric, this breaking out of the surplus thread or threads tied in the doubles notonly results in a manufacture of a proportionately nar-" rower fabric than desired, but in addition results I in'considerable waste in the warp yarn which becomes ordinary thread waste and is not incorporated in the woven fabric. a

What is claimed is: I

l. A process of conditioning cotton warps so that such warps may be utilized in a tying-in machine of the Barber-Colman type, provided with selectors to select, corresponding ends from the old and new warp threads to be knotted together and knotters for tying the knots, said selectors contacting said threads adjacent to, but removed from where they are knotted together, without the necessity of maintaining excessively high humidities, said process consisting in applying to the old warp ends andthe new warp ends, where they. are contacted by the selectors, adjacent, butremoved from the place where they areto be joined and knotted, a conditioning solution comprising .an oily material in water miscible form, an agent to cause quick penetration by lowering the surface tension of the water, a fungicide and an agent to prevent rusting of the metal parts of the machine, all in water solution.

2. In a process of the type which includes tying and knotting together the ends of cotton threads while under tension in a tying-in machine of the Barber-Colman type, provided with selectors to select corresponding ends from the old and new warp threads to be knotted together and knotters for tying the knots, said selectors contacting said threads adjacent, but removed from where they are knottedtogether, the step of conditioning said cotton threads, where they are contacted by the selectors, adjacent to, but substantially removed from the place of knotting and tying, said conditioning being accomplished by applying an oily material.

3. In the process of tying together cotton warp threads while under tensionin a tying-in machine of the Barber-Colman type, provided with selectors to select corresponding ends from the'old and new warp threads to be knotted together and knotters for tying the knots, said selectors contacting said threads adjacent, but removed from where they are knotted together, the step ofcon.- ditioning the strands adjacent the place where the tying together or knot ting is to take place, but leavingthe portion at which the knot or tie is to be formed unconditioned, severing the loose ends after said knotting or tying together and then conditioning the tied or knotted strand between said conditioned portions, which 1 will result in conditioning of the knots, said conditioning being accomplished by applying a soapy material. U v 4. A process of treating cotton warp threads incidental to the knotting together of the ends thereof while under tension in a tying-in ma chine of the Barber-Colman type, provided with selectors to select corresponding ends from the '75 old and new warp threads to be knotted togetherand knotters for tying the knots, said selectors contacting said threads adjacent, but removed from where they are knotted together, which comprises conditioning portions of said cotton warp threads where they are contacted by the selectors adjacent, but not at the place of tying together, with the conditioning compound containing a sulphonated high molecular weight aliphatic material, and then tying and knotting togetherthe unconditioned end portions.

5. The process of tying and knotting together the ends of cotton warp threads to be utilized for weaving, while said cotton warp threads are under tension in a tying-in machine of the Barber Col-- man type, provided with selectors to select corresponding'ends from the old and new warp threads to be knotted together and knotters for tying the knots, said selectors contacting said threads adjacent, but removed from where they are knotted together, which comprises conditioning with the conditioning compound about one-half inch lengths of said 'cotton warp threads where they are'contacted by the selectors, about two inches to three inches away from the place where the knot is tied, knotting together the ends, severing the loose ends projecting from the knot and then conditioning the portion intervening between two previously conditioned portions over and across the knot, said conditioning being accomplished by applying an aqueous dispersion of an alkaline material.

6. A process for utilizing a tying-in machine for cotton warps which is provided with clamp bars to place said cotton 'warps under tension, selectors toselect corresponding ends from the old and new warps to be knotted together, holders ,for holding the ends together during knotting and knotters for tying the knots, said process including the steps of conditioning the portions of the threads where the selectors contact the threads ers for holding the ends together during knotting and knotters for tying the knots, said process including the steps of conditioning the portions of the threads where the selectors contact the threads and next to the ribbon bars, while leaving the portions of the threads where the knot is to be tied unconditioned and then conditioning the knot after it has been formed and after the loose ends have been severed therefrom, said conditioning being accomplished by applying a aqueous dispersion of a sulphon'ated oil.

8. The process of using a tying-in machine for cotton warps of the Barber-Colman type provided with selectors to select corresponding ends from the old and new warp threads to be knotted;

together and knotters for tying the. knots, said selectors contacting said threads ad aacent, but vg the ribbon bar and for a distance of about -one-half inch lengthwise of the thread, and at threads where they are contacted by the selectors with the conditioning compound before the knotting operation, said conditioningbeing accomplished by applying an aqueous dispersion of an .oily derivative material.

9. A process of conditioning cotton warps in connection with their utilization in Barber-Colman tying-in machines, which comprises applyagent to cause quick penetration by lowering' the surface tension of the water, a fungicide and an agent to prevent rusting of the metal parts of the machine, said solution also including an agent to prevent gumming and sticking of the machine parts.

11. In the process of operating a tying-in machine of the Barber-Colman type, provided with' selectors, the step of conditioning the threads to be tied together at the place they are contacted by these selectors, by a solution including an oil,

which will cause the loose fibre ends to adhere to the main thread body before said main thread bodies are operated on by the selectors.

12. A process of conditioning cotton warp yarns to be operated on by a tying-in machine of the Barber-Colman type provided with two selectors, which comprises applying to such yarns at the place where they are acted upon'by the two selectors of-the tying-in machine, a homogenizing material in water miscible form, an agent to form quick penetration by lowering the sur-' facetension cf the solution, a fungicide, an agent to prevent rusting of the metal parts of the machine and an agent of such nature as to prevent gumming or sticking of the machine parts.

13. A process of conditioning a yarn for operation in a tying-in machine of the Barber-Colman type, provided with selectors to select corresponding ends from the old and new warp threads to be knotted together and knotters'for tying the knots, said selectors contacting said thread adjacent, but removed from where they are knotted together, which comprises applying a solution to the material at the place where they are contacted by the selectors, and adjacent where it is to be tied in so that the yarn adjacent the knot will be conditioned without affecting the loose ends cut away from the knot, said conditioning being accomplished by applying an aqueous dispersion of an oily derivative material.

14. In the process of conditioning warp yarns and being operated on in a tying-in machine of the Barber-Colman type, provided with selectors to select corresponding ends from the old and new warp threads to be knotted together and knotters for tying the knots, said selectors contacting said threads adjacent, but removed from where they are knotted together, the step of applying a conditioning and lubricating solution across the warp sheet from selvage to selvage up the place where the threads are engaged by the selectors, said conditioning .being accomplished by applying an aqueous dispersion of an. oily 

